1. Technical Field
The present invention relates to a method of manufacturing a liquid ejecting head configured to eject liquid from nozzle openings, a liquid ejecting head, and a liquid ejecting apparatus and, more specifically, to a method of manufacturing an ink jet printhead configured to discharge ink as liquid, an ink jet printhead, and an ink-jet printing apparatus.
2. Related Art
As a known representative example of the liquid ejecting head, for example, there is an ink jet printhead configured to discharge ink drops from nozzle openings using a pressure generated by a displacement of a piezoelectric element. More specifically, an ejecting head including a flow channel unit having a flow channel formed panel provided with pressure generating chambers which are in communication with nozzle openings and a diaphragm provided on the side of one of the surface thereof, piezoelectric elements (piezoelectric transducers) provided corresponding to the respective pressure generating chambers and fixed to a fixed substrate, and a case head (structure) having a storage portion for fixing the fixed substrate is known (see JP-A-2004-74740).
However, since the case head is fixed to the flow channel unit, if the positional accuracy of fixation of the fixed substrate to the case head is low, the positioning accuracy of the piezoelectric elements with respect to the pressure generating chambers is lowered, so that there arises a problem that desired ink discharging characteristics cannot be obtained.
In order to position the case head and the fixed substrate with a high degree of accuracy, a clearance between a storage portion of the case head and the fixed substrate must be controlled with a high degree of accuracy. Therefore, manufacture of the case head with a high degree of accuracy is required, so that there arise problems such that the manufacturing process is complicated, and that the manufacturing cost is increased.
In order to control the clearance between the case head and the fixed substrate with a high degree of accuracy, dimensional variations of the case head due to the temperature or the moisture must be followed. Therefore, a temperature control and a moisture control are required, so that there arise problems such that the manufacturing process is complicated, and that the manufacturing cost is increased.
Furthermore, in order to position the case head and the fixed substrate with a high degree of accuracy, a large scale of alignment apparatus might be required, so that there arise problems such that the manufacturing process is complicated, and that the manufacturing cost is increased.
In particular, in the ink jet printhead being elongated by increase in number of the nozzle openings, the length of the fixed substrate in the direction of parallel arrangement of the piezoelectric elements is also increased. Consequently, the longitudinal length of the storage portion of the case head is increased, and hence the control of the clearance between the fixed substrate and the storage portion becomes difficult.
Also, when bonding the flow channel unit to the case head and bonding a piezoelectric element unit to the case head and the flow channel unit, a state of being pressurized to each other must be maintained by a jig, and hence a plurality of jigs are needed when manufacturing a plurality of ink jet printheads, so that there arises a problem of increase in manufacturing cost.
Such problems as described above are not limited to the method of manufacturing the ink jet printhead, but exist also for the liquid ejecting head which ejects liquid other than ink.